Another British success story is passing into American hands. Vitabiotics, the Perfectil and Pregnacare maker that grew from a single London laboratory to become the country’s biggest vitamin company, has been sold to US private equity firm Bain Capital for £900million.
The deal ends five decades of family ownership and gives Dragons’ Den star Tej Lalvani, the group’s chief executive, and his father, Professor Kartar Lalvani, who founded the business in 1971.
For the wider SME community, it’s a story that splits both ways: proof that a founder-led British company can be built into a world leader, and another example of that value being made by an overseas buyer.
Vitabiotics is not a small player. Alongside Perfectil and Pregnacare it owns Wellman and Wellwoman, turns over £200million a year and exports to more than 70 countries, according to Bain Capital, which is buying the UK’s first vitamin company. Its products are fronted by names from model David Gandy to presenters Tess Daly and Davina McCall.
Tej Lalvani, 52, who sat as an investor on BBC’s Dragons’ Den between 2017 and 2021, said: “This marks an important moment in Vitabiotics’ journey.
‘I am very grateful to have had the opportunity to build on my father’s vision of using the power of science and food to improve everyday life and, together with our exceptional team, help transform Vitabiotics from a British family business into one of the most trusted vitamins and wellness companies in the world.’
His father, now 94, will take on the honorary role as outgoing chairman under the new owners. The Lalvani family is thought to be worth £525million, according to the Sunday Times Rich List.
Boston-based Bain stressed that the UK would remain ‘central’ to the business, which is headquartered in London, and said ‘there will be no immediate changes to day-to-day operations.’ Bain is perhaps best known for its £530million tilt at mutual insurer LV in 2021. Its interest in Vitabiotics surfaced earlier this year, when private equity giant Blackstone was also reportedly circling.
For owner-managers weighing their futures, selling is a live issue of the exit question that every founder eventually faces. Family succession preserves inheritance but requires careful planning; a private equity sale brightens the price but often means letting go. Vitabiotics, with its 94-year-old founder still involved, shows how long that decision can be delayed, and how big the prize can grow.
The background is a takeover market that is strongly biased towards foreign currency. Vitabiotics’ sales pitches amid a wave of deals in which US buyers are circling undervalued British firms, with dramatic weakness and depressed valuations making UK assets look cheap to dollar-value bidders.
It’s a pattern that is now being seen across the market, with foreign private equity closing in on British companies weakened by the stock market’s slide. Californian investment trust Prologis this week won the backing of FTSE 100 warehouse giant Segro in a £14billion deal, the fifth and largest London-listed company to accept a takeover this year after Intertek, Beazley, Schroders and DCC. EasyJet, Rotork, Mitie and Tate & Lyle are among others in the frame.
The outlook for entrepreneurs is clear enough: build something valuable and buyers will come. The vexing question for Britain is what is left behind when the check is gone.
